


You Go On

by stardropdream (orphan_account)



Category: Tiger & Bunny
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-24
Updated: 2013-02-24
Packaged: 2017-12-03 10:52:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/697478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/stardropdream
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Kaede had to remind herself that she loved her father.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Go On

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on LJ September 23, 2012. 
> 
> Pre-series fic.

  
  
**I.**  
When she was younger, she always thought that maybe he’d really show up to her competitions or recitals or honors ceremonies. But he never did. He never does.  
  
After the fifth time, she stops listening to his promises and then his excuses. They stretch on for years, but she’s learned not to expect anything. Maybe someday she’ll be pleasantly surprised, but she doubts it – she expects nothing, so she’ll be disappointed by nothing.   
  
She doesn’t let herself think about it too much because then she’ll start to get angry and bitter – and she doesn’t wish to feel that way.   
  
She tells herself she won’t be disappointed when he doesn’t show up because she never expects him to. And yet, every time, her eyes flit towards the entrance. And when he fails to show up yet again, it becomes that saturated, heavy lament of _I knew it._  
  
Of course.  
  
  
 **II.**  
“You shouldn’t hold these things against him,” her grandmother says. “He loves you very much.”  
  
But she hates to hear such things because of the weight of the words. She wants to be angry, to hate him because that would make the absence easier.   
  
If she hated him, it’d be easier. She wouldn’t care. If she hated him, she could just stop focusing on the disappointment. She could be happy.  
  
The fact that he loves her makes it so much worse. The fact that he loves her means so much more, and becomes so much worse.   
  
  
**III.**  
“You shouldn’t go to bed angry with him. You never know what tomorrow will bring.”  
  
But Grandma always says things like that, as if her dad’s office job is deadly. Like he could be crushed by a mountain of paperwork at any moment and that would be that.   
  
The scolding touches a nerve because she snaps back, “I don’t care! Let him die for all I care.”  
  
“Kaede…” her grandma says in shock, disappointment.  
  
She regrets the words instantly, wants to take it back, but instead she stubbornly stomps up to her room. She throws herself on her bed and crams her face into the pillow.  
  
“I don’t mean it,” she mumbles. Her eyes fill with tears and she hates herself.   
  
  
**IV.**  
His smiling face on the other end of the telephone only makes her frown more and more. His perpetual cheerfulness does little to settle her nerves, settle her frustrations, settle her longing and disappointment. She tries so hard not to be bitter.  
  
But she doesn’t understand how he can always look so happy. Grandma says it’s because he’s trying to be strong for her.  
  
She wishes he’d stop smiling as if everything is normal and happy between them.   
  
  
**V.**  
She does wish he’d move home. She doesn’t understand why he has to live in the city. Or why he can’t live with her and Grandma.  
  
It hurts. She thinks that maybe someday her dad will forget her and that will be that.  
  
She doesn’t know what’s worse. The fact that he loves her but has no time for her. Or the idea that he could stop loving her even with all the time in the world.


End file.
